Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die • Hacker News Board

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#271

Post by onefuncman » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 9:36 AM UTC

_AzMoo wrote: post #193

jdfellow wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder how much effort it would take to build a desktop application providing a similar user experience to Access, using SQLite.

Why would you do that though? The underlying database technology is not really one of the problems access has.

Sure it is ... the database underlying Access uses JetSQL which has its own fun syntactic quirks

It's also very bad at concurrent users if you do go down the path of dropping it on a network share if it's a normalized schema, since there's no server to cache queries or do optimizations... for strictly data entry against a simple schema you can maybe push it to low 100s of users, but backing up / restoring / rolling out new versions is a nightmare when the frontend and backend are commingled like that. You can deploy different versions of .mdbs if you have an external backend, though I've never seen anyone do so with an Access database backing an Access "UI" project...

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#272

Post by onefuncman » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 9:36 AM UTC

kwhitefoot wrote: post #268

mycall wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fun getting everyone to close their MSAccess processes so you can do some changes to the MDB.

I partially fixed that by splitting the mdb into a front end and a back end where the back end was only tables (no UI, no queries) and launching the front end mdb from a simple command script that copied it to the users tmp directory first. Then at least I could fix bugs in the UI and after a while that's where most of the bugs were.

huh, i just posted before i saw this comment that I never saw anyone plan out their access database like this, kudos

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#273

Post by onefuncman » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 9:38 AM UTC

SigmundA wrote: post #30

I have a special place in my heart for Access, its where I first started making money writing software and learned SQL and VB. Its where I really felt like I was making something that solved real world problems for people, quickly at that. It was actually amazing how far it could scale, you could put a shared MDB file out on a Novell network share and have 30 concurrent users with no server app at all, users just dou…

i have no affiliation but like the product -- try https://airtable.com/

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#274

Post by caseymarquis » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 9:40 AM UTC

thrower123 wrote: post #102

alkonaut wrote: post #12

Is there a modern and/or open alternative to this? E.g a SQLite + electron or local web client thing where you could build a simple inventory or similar but you should also be able to scale it to client server when the need occurs 10 years down. Note that any number of cloud startups don’t count as an alternative to access. When these things start it’s as an excel sheet with data that no one will go through the enter…

As soon as you bring HTML and JS in, projects choke and die. There is just too much goldbricking and fiddling and fussing and yak shaving around possible, and almost none of it is in service of actually making anything. The friction binds the gears up horrifically. Something like WinForms with SQLite that didn't use Entity Framework would be far better. But really all we want is to get back to VB6 on top of Access. M…

I have a good amount of experience with both winforms and modern web development. I would pick winforms over vanilla html and js. However, I would easily pick vuejs (or any comparable component based web framework) over winforms. Having maintained legacy VB apps with multiple 5000+ line forms, inscrutable multidirectional event chaining, and tangled up business logic and view logic, I've become a huge fan of forced separation of concerns.

The big problem is that there is much more of a learning curve. The first useful software I wrote used VB6 and winforms. Getting started was easy and intuitive, with a gentle learning curve. With virtually no experience, I was making neat things in hours. Within days I was making full applications. That says something about the power of that platform.

To be truly effective with modern web development took me a year or so. That was after years of professional experience.

At this point I can build web applications faster than I can build desktop software, but it took a huge time investment to reach this point, and I had to build multiple tools to make it possible.

I agree that there's a niche that needs filling. I want all the benefits of modern web development, and I want a learning curve like VB6 with Access.

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#275

Post by miki123211 » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 9:44 AM UTC

In polish high schools, Access is still a part of the computer science curriculum (for those who take CS). It doesn't have to be Access specifically, but it is in 99% of cases. You can't really avoid it, as it's required on the Matura exam. I've heard rumors that some teachers even teach the point and click interface instead of SQL.

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#276

Post by m1k1 » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 9:47 AM UTC

miki123211 wrote: post #275

In polish high schools, Access is still a part of the computer science curriculum (for those who take CS). It doesn't have to be Access specifically, but it is in 99% of cases. You can't really avoid it, as it's required on the Matura exam. I've heard rumors that some teachers even teach the point and click interface instead of SQL.

I even had point and click access on "information technology" course on the life sciences faculy on of the biggest polish university ~7 years ago

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#277

Post by mmsimanga » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 10:00 AM UTC

m_eiman wrote: post #269

mmsimanga wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

NSBase[0] markets itself as Access replacement using sqlite as backend. It's built using Lazarus IDE and has lua scripting. It's free and works on Windows, Linux and Mac. I haven't taken it through the ropes to see how good it is. [0] http://www.nsbase.neuts.fr/en/

Seems like it's Windows and Linux only, at least according to the (outdated) web, and the download page.

Thanks for correction. I cannot edit my comment, too much time has lapsed. I was reading up on Lazarus IDE about the time I discovered NSBase and somehow got it in my head that NSBase supports same platforms as Lazarus IDE. Apologies to those I have misinformed.

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#278

Post by jalla » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 10:22 AM UTC

Any database system that has a 'Repair' function is a liability. Access should be taught as a primer at schools and universities on what not to use. It's the BASIC of databases - considered harmful.

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#279

Post by blihp » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 10:23 AM UTC

TeMPOraL wrote: post #241

blihp wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing that was lost quite frankly was most of the value that desktop productivity software used to provide before Microsoft consumed the market with Windows. It's not that client/server couldn't provide the same (or even better) value, it's that the companies left standing (think Microsoft, Oracle, IBM etc.) had no interest in providing maximum value to customers. They wanted to extract maximum value from custome…

It's interesting to see that, given that in modern times, Microsoft is the only tech giant that can still build user-empowering software. Not Windows, that's getting dumbed down UX-side. But Office suite still includes Access and Excel, the latter being probably the single highest productivity booster in modern companies (to the chagrin of IT departments). And you're essentially saying that this is already another or…

If you look at how things have progressed from the GUI desktop->web->mobile you get a reasonably good flavor of the trade-offs that have been, and continue to be, made. Compare the richest, most powerful spreadsheet application you can find on the desktop to the same on the web to the same on mobile... there you go ;-) (and it isn't just the relative maturity of the platforms: once one player dominates a platform, things start to stagnate)

If history is any guide, the mobile spreadsheet will never do some (probably much) of what the desktop version did[1] and the desktop version will never get some of the new capabilities of the mobile version[2]... yet over time the less capable, but 'better', mobile app will become the new normal for many. The good news is the mobile version will still be more powerful than whatever platform comes next.

I'm greatly over-simplifying and glossing over some things (esp. re: the dynamics of the text UI and early GUI eras) but I think the basic idea still holds.

[1] It's 'good enough' for the majority of use cases. Some would argue that the lost features were cruft anyway. Which is fine unless you needed that cruft...

[2] The profit motive is no longer strong enough to warrant the needed investment in structural changes to the desktop application

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#280

Post by kabes » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 10:26 AM UTC

jalla wrote: post #278

Any database system that has a 'Repair' function is a liability. Access should be taught as a primer at schools and universities on what not to use. It's the BASIC of databases - considered harmful.

Then again, you can use a connector to connect it to MSSQl, MySQl, Oracle and others. And you still have a very powerful tool for reporting, forms, queries etc.